Films rock a new generation
A film festival screening Khmer cinema classics draws a huge response from youngsters, with hundreds gathering for the rock’n’roll closing party.
Showing posts with label khmer news. Show all posts
Showing posts with label khmer news. Show all posts
Happy 10 years Anniversary for the Auckland Cambodian Youth and Recreation Trust
Leader of The Auckland Cambodian Youth and Recreation Trust
Join by the singers from Cambodia Mr. York Doung DAra and Miss Chea Channy
A Reason for Hun Sen’s Contempt for Thailand
7 October 2009
Last Friday (October 2), Pheu Thai MP Chalerm Yoobamrung admitted to have given to Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen an audio clip that features Foreign Affairs Minister Kasit Piromya criticizing him. He explained that as some people were trying to root out exiled former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra, he could do the same to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva....
What I saw on the news the next day was the picture of the Cambodian prime minister exchanging greetings and pleasantries with the Thai foreign affairs minister in the second meeting of foreign ministers from Japan and five countries on the Mekong River, held in Siam Reap province of Cambodia.
Earlier, Hun Sen said with strong words that he had ordered his troops to shoot Thai trespassers if they illegally crossed the border to Cambodia’s territory. He also threatened to withdraw from the ASEAN summit to be held in Thailand at the end of October.
However, just a few days after Hun Sen’s declaration, a source at the Thai Foreign Ministry revealed that the Cambodian leader would definitely attend the summit.
I recounted these events in order to show how crafty Hun Sen is and that he could use the Preah Vihear dispute as political ploy at will.
And while Chalerm was bragging about his secret delivery of Kasit’s clip, I could imagine Hun Sen sitting on his prime minister chair and enjoying the Thai government and the Opposition fighting each other
In Hun Sen’s eyes, Chalerm is perhaps a bit like a mischievous kid, an image that is a stark contrast to a prior impression that the Thai politician was respectable and, most of all, mature.
Chalerm’s move is quite embarrassing to the nation considering Hun Sen had long gotten his hands on the clip complete with a Cambodian subtitle. It is said that he had ordered his men to check on the background of anyone who spoke about his country.
It is not surprising at all that the Cambodian prime minister would be well informed of what happened in Thailand as he has an embassy and many news sources here.
Can you imagine what Hun Sen would think after he received the clip with the sender’s name of Charlerm?
What would you say if a member of your rival approaches you and offers to sell information to you?
If that occurred to me, as a good citizen who has every conscience to protect the interest of his own country, I would ask myself, how in the world could this guy be disloyal to his country?
And that might explain why Hun Sen is always looking at Thailand with disdain.
Cambodia's trade with Hong Kong down 24 pct to end July
PHNOM PENH, Oct. 7 (Xinhua) -- Bilateral trade between Cambodia and China's Hong Kong dropped 24.39 percent in the first seven months year-on-year, local media reported Wednesday.
Citing the data released by... the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, the reports said trade between the two sides fell to 288 million U.S. dollars from 380.94 million dollars last year.
Hong Kong's total exports to Cambodia fell to 279 million dollars from 375.5 million dollars, while Cambodia's shipments in return increased to 9 million dollars from 5.44 million dollars during the year up to the end of July.
The figures were released Tuesday at a press conference to attract Cambodian companies to hold trade exhibitions in Hong Kong.
"The drop was because of the global financial crisis. However, now trade between Cambodia and Hong Kong is becoming stable because the economy is not so bad; it may not drop further," Johnny Wan, senior exhibitions manager at the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, was quoted by the Phnom Penh Post as saying.
Cambodia's main exports to Hong Kong were food items, garments and footwear, and gemstones, he said. "Cambodia has so many good products, but foreigners may not know much about them, so Cambodia should promote more ... through trade shows and marketing," Wan said.
Citing the data released by... the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, the reports said trade between the two sides fell to 288 million U.S. dollars from 380.94 million dollars last year.
Hong Kong's total exports to Cambodia fell to 279 million dollars from 375.5 million dollars, while Cambodia's shipments in return increased to 9 million dollars from 5.44 million dollars during the year up to the end of July.
The figures were released Tuesday at a press conference to attract Cambodian companies to hold trade exhibitions in Hong Kong.
"The drop was because of the global financial crisis. However, now trade between Cambodia and Hong Kong is becoming stable because the economy is not so bad; it may not drop further," Johnny Wan, senior exhibitions manager at the Hong Kong Trade Development Council, was quoted by the Phnom Penh Post as saying.
Cambodia's main exports to Hong Kong were food items, garments and footwear, and gemstones, he said. "Cambodia has so many good products, but foreigners may not know much about them, so Cambodia should promote more ... through trade shows and marketing," Wan said.
Infant Saved After H1N1 Claims Mother
By Heng Reaksmey, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
06 October 2009
Cambodian health authorities operated to save the life of a premature child taken from its 25-year-old Cambodian mother, who died of H1N1 flu on Tuesday, officials said...
She was seven months pregnant, and officials at Calmette hospital saved the child through a cesarean operation, Minister of Health Mam Bunheng told reporters.
"The baby is lucky after doctors operated on its mother," he said. "The baby was born healthy."
The woman's death brings the toll from the disease to three in Cambodia, with an estimated 120 infections. A 47-year-old Cambodian man died of the virus, sometimes called swine flu, on Monday.
"We should strengthen people's health, because the epidemic of sine flu virus is fast," Mam Bunheng said.
The World Health Organization estimates more than 340,000 confirmed cases of A H1N1 worldwide and more than 41,000 deaths.
Original report from Phnom Penh
06 October 2009
Cambodian health authorities operated to save the life of a premature child taken from its 25-year-old Cambodian mother, who died of H1N1 flu on Tuesday, officials said...
She was seven months pregnant, and officials at Calmette hospital saved the child through a cesarean operation, Minister of Health Mam Bunheng told reporters.
"The baby is lucky after doctors operated on its mother," he said. "The baby was born healthy."
The woman's death brings the toll from the disease to three in Cambodia, with an estimated 120 infections. A 47-year-old Cambodian man died of the virus, sometimes called swine flu, on Monday.
"We should strengthen people's health, because the epidemic of sine flu virus is fast," Mam Bunheng said.
The World Health Organization estimates more than 340,000 confirmed cases of A H1N1 worldwide and more than 41,000 deaths.
From Killing Fields to Fields of Dreams
Joe Cook (L) (Photo: LA Time)
Cambodian baseball playersOctober 6, 2009
John Perra
Editor: John Feffer
Foreign Policy In Focus (www.fpif.org)
Cambodia is an unlikely place for baseball. There is chronic poverty, lingering post-war trauma, and rampant human trafficking. Children are more likely to work or rummage through the fetid muck of the Steung Meanchey dump than go to school or play.
But for the last seven years, Joe Cook, a Cambodian refugee, has been teaching the game in his homeland, building Cambodia's first ball field. Last year, he even managed to put together a national team. In March, they finally won their first game, playing a short series against a team from Vietnam. Considering the violent history the two countries share, just playing the game was an accomplishment beyond any scorecard.
Becoming Joe Cook
For Joe Cook, playing games came to an abrupt end in August 1975. He was Jouret Puk then, the son of a high-ranking Cambodian official who commanded nearly 3,000 troops. "My little sister and I were playing behind our house," Cook remembers. "All of a sudden we saw people dressed in black and red marching toward us. We were scared and we hid behind a tree." Those people were the Khmer Rouge and they invaded his village, burning homes to the ground. "They got us all in one place," he recalls, "then they forced us to march to a camp," he says. Cook's father was killed, and his family was split up and forced into labor camps. Cook's youngest sisters were among the 2 million executed by Pol Pot's regime. In 1978, Cook, then eight, escaped his camp with his mother and oldest brother, trying to reach the Thai border.
For a week, they made their way barefoot. "It was only 18 miles to the border but it turned into 80 because we had to keep moving back and forth, criss-cross because landmines were everywhere. So were the Khmer Rouge, and the Vietnamese who had just invaded." The three refugees had only a small cup of rice between them, so to survive they ate crickets, grass, leaves, and tree bark. "I can remember catching frogs and eating them alive," Cook says. The pools of water they came across were polluted with the dead bodies of pigs, cows, and people. "I tried to brush the blood back to drink," he recalls, "It was so thick and bitter." Bodies lined the roads and when they ran into other people escaping from the camps, they would barter for food.
Finally, they made it to the Thai border and then to a series of refugee camps. In the Philippines, they found a sponsor through the U.S. embassy and arrived in Chattanooga, Tennessee in May 1983. "We couldn't even pronounce Tennessee. And we thought America must be near France because you had to take a plane to both of them," he says.
In America
There, everything was new. "I thought it was like a dream," Cook says, "A stove, a toilet, a TV. It was fascinating." And then there was the game he saw being played near his home.
"All I knew was that it was some kind of sport," he says. It was baseball. "I watched them behind a fence," he recalls, "I saw them having fun. I saw happy faces. As a kid in Cambodia, there was never happiness. But I knew in baseball is happiness. I kept going back every day. Finally I got the guts to go onto the field."
Through a combination of limited English and gestures, he made it clear to the coach that he wanted to play too. "When he gave me a glove so I could play catch, it felt like he had given me the whole uniform. I was like the other kids," he recalls. It was the start of a deep passion.
Baseball was also a way to assimilate. He became "Joe Cook," a chef in a Japanese steakhouse in Alabama, listening to Atlanta Braves baseball on the radio in his kitchen. He married and had two children.
In 2002, Cook's older sister Chamty, who he thought had perished, called from Cambodia. After years of brutality in the labor camps, she had been released in 1990 and used the Internet to track down members of her family. Cook agreed to reunite with her in Cambodia.
As a way of honoring him, Chamty wanted to travel to the airport to meet him. But the transportation costs were more than she could afford. She made a difficult decision. So as not to lose her brother again, she sold her son to traffickers. "When I arrived and found out, I was devastated," Cook says, choking up, "She didn't understand that I could've met her anywhere. I never would've wanted her to do that." The first thing he did was buy back his nephew, Chea Theara, for $86.
Bringing Baseball Home
"He was so happy, so proud that his uncle had the ability to do that, he wanted to show me his town and also share his town with me," says Cook. Chea showed Cook his school in Baribo, a village in Kampong Chhang province about 68 miles west of Phnom Penh, and near it an open field. Cook thought it would make a good spot for a baseball diamond. "What's baseball?" Chea asked. "It's a crazy game that I love," Cook told him, "I'll come back and bring equipment and teach you."
And he did. Eventually he built Cambodia's first baseball field in Baribo and began instructing kids there in the fundamentals of the game. Soon he was feeding them, teaching them English, and establishing the national team that includes Chea on its roster.
For several years, Cambodia's government wanted to shut down baseball in Cambodia. It was too American for them, according to Cook. "They kept saying, 'how about soccer?'" he says.
Although also a product of Western influence when the French brought it to Cambodia in the 1930s, soccer has been a hugely popular sport in the country for decades. The skill of Cambodia's players was the envy of much of Southeast Asia until the Khmer Rouge all but put an end to the sport. It wasn't until the 1990s that Cambodian soccer began to regain its strength, with teams competing and winning in international tournaments.
Likewise, Pradal Serey, an ancient boxing style best known for its martial arts roots and kicking technique, has begun to reemerge as a national sport. It too was nearly lost to history when the Khmer Rouge banned traditional martial arts and executed its boxers.
But Cambodia has spent more than a decade now regaining its athletic prominence. It returned to the Olympics in 1996 after a 24-year absence and has participated in those games ever since.
Coming Around to Baseball
Despite the national focus on soccer, Cook kept baseball in Cambodia going, supporting the game out of his own pocket and getting some help with equipment and coaches from Major League Baseball. Then this year, the national team started winning, beating Vietnam in that friendly series and gaining professional bragging rights by besting Malaysia in May in an official game between the countries. A governor donated land for another field after that.
Cambodia's people are starting to come around to the game. Other baseball clubs and organizations have sprung up in the past few months, including one in the capital city of Phnom Penh. The organizer of that group is a young man in his earlier twenties who calls Cook "Bong," the Khmer word for "brother," a sign of respect. That pleases Cook and he laughs, "I am baseball's big brother." In reality, Cook is now president of the Cambodia Baseball Federation.
In August, Cook developed the first regional leagues within Cambodia. The Braves, representing the west, and the Royals, in the east, play each other nearly every day. "Someday I want to build a stadium here," says Cook. The image of a stadium leaves even him, baseball's true believer here, awestruck. "Can you imagine a baseball stadium in Cambodia?" he asks.
John Perra is a journalist, a contributor to Ancient Gonzo Wisdom: Interviews with Hunter S. Thompson (Da Capo 2009), and a contributor to Foreign Policy In Focus.
Cambodia: BarCamp Phnom Penh 2009
Wednesday, October 7th, 2009
By Tharum Bun
Global Voices Online
More than 800 tech-inclined Cambodians gathered at the second annual BarCamp Phnom Penh on October 3-4, 2009 at Paññasastra University of Cambodia.
Last year's success inspired this small, growing technology community in Cambodia to discuss openly issues important to them. BarCamp Phnom Penh has now become an annual technology conference in this nation's largest capital city, inviting some participants from across the country and the region, many are tech enthusiasts from Vietnam, Thailand and Singapore.
Last year's success inspired this small, growing technology community in Cambodia to discuss openly issues important to them. BarCamp Phnom Penh has now become an annual technology conference in this nation's largest capital city, inviting some participants from across the country and the region, many are tech enthusiasts from Vietnam, Thailand and Singapore.
In a blog post on CNNGo, technologist and traveler Preetam Rai, who visited this year's participatory workshop-event, wrote about Cambodian women in technology that:
It should be said that women are very prominent at Cambodian Barcamp events, and seeing such large numbers of women at tech meetings still surprises their male attendees. But the women aren't just showing up — they're running the show.
How BarCamp Phnom Penh ‘09 is run, organized and contributed is uniquely interesting. It does introduce Cambodians a new way, if not a breakthrough, in which learning, collaboration, sharing and networking can take place here in Cambodia.
A prolific Vietnamese blogger, Nguyen Anh Hung, who participated Cambodia's BarCamp last year, is traveling to the Cambodian capital with more of his fellow friends for this BarCamp Phnom Penh ‘09.
“It’s here again. We (the folks in Ho Chi Minh City) will be flocking to the capital of beautiful Cambodia once again to attend the largest technology unconference in the country to date. Last year it was a greatly successful event attended by some 300 people from around South East Asia.”
Not only this annual event plays a role to foster open communication in Cambodian society, but it helps build a strong foundation for Cambodia's future in the area of Information and Communication Technologies.
Going to conferences is about getting inspired. It’s about getting some new ideas swirl around in your head. During that event, we will see skilled speakers with a lot of experiences and confidence on stage giving a talk on a topic that they really want to share, wrote Samnang Chhun, a Phnom Penh-based Software Developer.
Like many other developing countries, debate on free/open source software as an alternative to propriety software will not end any time soon. Despite the two-day conference offered mixed results to every participant, online discussion has not finished yet.
Michael Smith Jr., from Yahoo Inc., wrote in an email:
[it] looks like a good turnout. I would hope that for any future ones Yahoo Inc. can get more involved to sponsor and maybe have a session.
A-two-minute video clip (taken by German new media consultant Thomas Wanhoff) of Cambodia's BarCamp can be viewed here.
BarCamp, an innovative “impromptu” gathering that began in 2005 in Palo Alto, California, helps “open source” enthusiasts share information about technology in an informal setting. The idea quickly spread from California to the rest of the world, arriving in Bangkok in 2007 and now in Phnom Penh.
Police, FBI Bust Seven in Major Drug Raid
Chhay Sinarith shows the seized heroin packages and other paraphernalia (Photo: Bunry, Koh Santepheap)By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
06 October 2009
Cambodian police working with the US Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested seven people and seized 16 kilograms of heroin, following three months of investigation, officials said Monday. Police also found counterfeit US dollars in the Oct. 2 raid.
“In the operation, we did an investigation and tracked [the suspects] down for almost three months, with the support of the FBI representative in Cambodia,” said Chhay Sinarith, chief of the Interior Ministry’s security department.
Suspects were arrested in Phnom Penh and Stung Treng province. The raid included the arrest of Lam Sokha, a suspected trafficker who has been arrested and released in recent years, police and court officials said.
The seven suspects were sent to Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Monday and would be questioned by prosecutors this week, officials said.
Police said the heroin moved through neighboring countries through Stung Treng, which borders Laos.
The discovery of heroin, crystal methamphetamine, or “ice,” drug production and counterfeit money made the raid a major case, Chhay Sinarith said.
The US State Department praised Cambodia for its anti-drug efforts in 2009, but said the country faces increasing problems of consumption, trafficking and the production of dangerous drugs.
The State Department warned that crackdowns on trafficking in Thailand and China had made Cambodia an attractive route for traffickers, while internally, use of amphetamines, including ice, was escalating.
3 Cambodians die of flu A(H1N1)
PHNOM PENH, Oct. 6 — The Cambodian Health Ministry said on Tuesday that two more Cambodians died of A(H1N1) virus so far, raising the total death number to three in Cambodia.
A 24-year-old pregnant woman and a 41-year-old Cambodian man became the second and third person that died of the flu A(H1N1) after a 40-year-old woman died late last month.
"We all regret for those persons who died of the disease," Mum Bun Heng, health minister said in a news conference at the Calmette Hospital here.
He also appealed to all local people to take care of themselves from this flu and to observe proper hygiene and sanitation.
"We should be cautious in the upcoming Royal Water Festival which falls on Oct. 31 to Nov. 3 because people are crowded at that time," he said, calling on people who have been infected with the flu not to go to the festival to avoid spreading it to other people.
Usually, in the water festival, millions of Cambodian people across the country will rush on to Phnom Penh to celebrate the boat racing.
And so far in total, about 120 people have infected with the flu in Cambodia. The ministry said that it will update the information on website in each week. (PNA/Xinhua) vcs/utb
A 24-year-old pregnant woman and a 41-year-old Cambodian man became the second and third person that died of the flu A(H1N1) after a 40-year-old woman died late last month.
"We all regret for those persons who died of the disease," Mum Bun Heng, health minister said in a news conference at the Calmette Hospital here.
He also appealed to all local people to take care of themselves from this flu and to observe proper hygiene and sanitation.
"We should be cautious in the upcoming Royal Water Festival which falls on Oct. 31 to Nov. 3 because people are crowded at that time," he said, calling on people who have been infected with the flu not to go to the festival to avoid spreading it to other people.
Usually, in the water festival, millions of Cambodian people across the country will rush on to Phnom Penh to celebrate the boat racing.
And so far in total, about 120 people have infected with the flu in Cambodia. The ministry said that it will update the information on website in each week. (PNA/Xinhua) vcs/utb
Goods and tourists now moving more quickly between Vietnam and Cambodia
06/10/2009
(Post by CAAI News Media)
VietNamNet Bridge – A Vietnam and Cambodia border agreement is boosting exporting and tourism and making the future existence of a three-country visa a possibility.
Phnom Penh, Cambodia (Photo: AP)
Following the agreement, which took effect on September 30, goods consignments carried overland between Vietnam and Cambodia will be able to cross borders without having to change vehicles as before.
According to Pham Xuan Thu, head of the supply division of HCM City-based Saigon Paper Company, the changes make it much faster for his organisation. Before it meant considerable delay and borders and a change of vehicle.
Now, Thu says, the company is planning to carry goods directly from Vietnam to Cambodia and further lower time and cost.
It is expected that with the new road transport agreement, it will take Vietnamese businesses 15-30 minutes only to fulfill administrative procedures at the border gate.
One director explained that previously businesses had to spend two days and one night to carry goods from HCM City to Cambodia through Moc Bai border gate in Tay Ninh province, 70km northwest of HCM City, including half a day to load and upload goods. In order to bring goods to the centre of Phnom Penh, he had to pay $2,500-$2,800 as a transport fee for every 12 metre-long vehicle which is equal to a 40 feet container vehicle.
A sales agent of a plastics company, said that as vehicles can now go straight to Cambodia across the border - the risks in cargo carrying are minimised. He says that the changing of vehicles at the border gates often led to the theft of goods on the way.
The road transport agreement has been welcomed not only by producers and traders, but by tourism firms as well.
Currently, Vietnamese tourists mostly go to Cambodia through Moc Bai international border gate. As most of Vietnamese vehicles are not allowed to enter Cambodian territory, tourists have to walk through the border gate to fulfill administrative procedures and then take Cambodian vehicles to continue the trips, which is really inconvenient to tourists.
Nguyen Van My, director of Lua Viet Travel Firm, said that most tourists want to stay in the same vehicle throughout their trip. It’s hoped the agreement will also boost tourist numbers.
So Mara, a senior official of Cambodian Ministry of Tourism, emphasised that the road transport agreement is an important step in applying the one-visa scheme for three countries, Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
Deadly Typhoon Heads Toward Taiwan
Poor planning blamed for Philippines flooding
PHOTO
Houses destroyed by flooding after Typhoon Ketsana passed through Marikina City, east of the Philippines capital Manila. [ABC]
Wires
(Post by CAAI News Media)
Philippine officials are blaming poor urban planning for the extreme flooding caused by two recent typhoons that killed nearly 300 people.
President Gloria Arroyo's spokesman, Cerge Remonde says lapses in urban planning saw housing estates and shantytowns spring up near reservoirs and lakes.
He says widespread devastation by Tropical Storm Ketsana and Typhoon Parma shows the urgency of re-planning Metro Manila.
Mr Remonde says problems that need solving include insufficient drainage, clogged waterways, uncontrolled housing development, and the proliferation of slums along riverbanks.
Ketsana dumped a month's worth of rain over Manila within a few hours on September 26, triggering the country's heaviest flooding in 40 years.
Flood water has been slow to recede in the capital.
Parma, hit Luzon eight days later, boosting the stagnant flood waters and ruining vast areas of rice fields.
Relief effort
Meanwhile, the American military says hundreds of its troops are involved in the flood relief effort in the Philippines.
Officials say marines and sailors posted in the Manila area have been helping to clear roads, deliver supplies and provide basic medical care.
Gwendoline Pang, of the Philippine Red Cross, says continuing bad weather is hampering progress.
"In the evacuation centres, it's so congested, and they've been there for more than a week already, almost two weeks. Also the clean-up effort is becoming very challenging, because before we can clean up the area, another typhoon is coming again," said Ms Pang.
Cambodia death toll
The death toll in Cambodia is at least 17 after Typhoon Ketsana swept through the country.
But the National Committee for Disaster Management believes that number is likely to increase still further.
Ketsana caused widespread flooding in Cambodia, destroying homes and crops, and displacing thousands of families.
Cambodia rejects landmine beauty contest
The Age
The Cambodian government has urged the cancellation of a beauty pageant in which landmine victims will compete to win a prosthetic leg, organisers say.
In the Miss Landmine Cambodia contest, 20 competitors from around the country are due to appear in a photo exhibition opening on Friday in Phnom Penh, followed by an internet voting campaign to select the best candidate.
But in a letter to organisers, the Ministry of Social Affairs has called on them to cancel the contest - although the Cambodian Mine Action Authority said in 2007 it fully supported the event.
"The ministry asks the people who organise this contest to stop this action ... for protecting ... the honour and dignity of people with disabilities," the letter said in English.
But Norwegian pageant director Morten Traavik said the contest, which offers as the top prize a custom-made prosthetic leg, would increase awareness about the victims of landmines.
"I have asked to meet the Cambodian officials to clear up our misunderstanding, and I hope once they know about our project details, they will welcome this," he said.
He explained that the pageant aimed "to raise awareness of what landmines have done to the people", adding that it would be a "big shame" if people could not see the exhibition.
The first Miss Landmine contest was held in Angola last year, drawing protests from rights activists who viewed it as exploitative and racist.
Cambodia remains one of the world's most heavily mined countries, along with Afghanistan and Angola.
Hundreds of people are killed or maimed every year by the millions of landmines and other unexploded ordnance still littering the countryside after decades of conflict.
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen cancelled a Miss Cambodia beauty pageant in 2006, saying he would not allow such a contest until poverty in Cambodia was reduced by more than half.
Thailand opposed oil concessionaires awarded to Total off the coast of Sihanoukville
The yellow areas are the areas awarded to Total which are described as "Thailand-Cambodia Claim Area Blocks".Source: Koh Santepheap newspaper
Reported in English by Khmerization
Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong has led a delegation to the 6th border talks with Thailand in Bangkok from 4-6 August. According to official sources, the talks will be centred on the delimitation and demarcation of the general borders between the two countries.
But unofficial sources said that the agenda of the meeting will be focused more on the oil concessionaires recently awarded to the French company, Total, which was said to be opposed by the Thai government.
The Koh Santepheap newspaper reported that a Thai website has reported that a group of Thai "yellow shirt" activists had lodged a letter of complaint against the oil concessionaires awarded to Total by saying that the areas awarded to Total are located in the Thai territorial waters. The letter stated that the concessionaires awarded to Total by the Cambodian government is illegal which will eventually cause diplomatic frictions between Thailand and France, including the impact on trades and businesses between the two countries.
Ms. Vimol Kitchob, spokeswoman for the Thai Foreign Ministry, was quoted by the website as saying that the areas awarded to Total by the Cambodian government used to called "overlapping areas", but the two governments later agreed to stop using the words "overlapping areas" because she said there is no part of the areas that was "overlapped". The website quoted the Thai spokeswoman as saying that the areas are "undelimited areas"- meaning that the areas have not been decided to which countries they belong.
Samlaut Uprising might be repeated as peasants faced land confiscations
Samlaut residents showing Radio Free Asia reporter the lands in dispute.Source: Radio Free Asia
Reported in English by Khmerization
Sources from Samlaut on 30th July said that many Samluat peasants in western parts of Battambang province are facing losing thousands of hectares of their lands to a private development company.
Sources said a private company, Rath Sambath, is planning to develop on 5,200 hectares of farm lands the peasants claimed they owned since the Khmer Rouge still control the areas in the 1980s and 1990s.
One peasant said: "At that time, Cambodia was still at civil war, we have not achieved peace yet. But after 1993, after the peace talks (between the government and the Khmer Rouge), we came to clear the lands, some were killed, some have their limbs blown off (by landmines) in these areas."
According to the map of the Rath Sambath concessionaires, it was indicated that in 2002 the 5,200 hectares of lands were areas covered with thick forests. But according to the on-the-spot survey report, the concessionaires had covered 946 hectares of lands owned by peasants from 200 families in three communes.
A human rights investigator from the human rights group Adhoc, who investigated the case on the ground, said: "First, there must be a re-evaluation of the areas. Secondly, we appeal to the company not call any more meetings to intimidate (to coerce people to accept the comapnay's terms). Thirdly, I notice that the concession agreements (with the governent) are surrounded with secrecy, especially in regard to the documentations."
Radio Free Asia is unable to seek comments from provincial officials or representatives from Rath Sambath company.
Many analysts are of the view that this land dispute might lead to a repeat of the Samlaut Uprising when the Samlaut peasants launched a peasant rebellion in 1967 after provincial and government officials forcibly confiscated their lands. Thousands of Samlaut residents were brutally killed in the government crackdowns. Many people fled to a near by mountain called Phnom Vay Chap and set up a guerrilla base to oppose the government. Khmer Rouge leaders later claimed that the Samlaut Uprising was the cornerstone of their peasant revolution that brought them to powers in 1975.
